


Ineffably Inevitable

by shilo1364



Category: Good Omens (TV), Good Omens - Neil Gaiman & Terry Pratchett
Genre: Fluff, Idiots in Love, Ineffable Husbands (Good Omens), M/M, Pining, after the end of the world that wasn't
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-06-13
Updated: 2019-06-13
Packaged: 2020-05-07 07:08:29
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,566
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19204393
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/shilo1364/pseuds/shilo1364
Summary: Crowley didn't mean to fall, not really. But maybe it was inevitable -- or at least, ineffable -- all along





	Ineffably Inevitable

**Author's Note:**

> Have I fallen head over heels for these two dorks? Yes. Is this the first thing I’ve been able to write in 8 months? Also yes. Is there a plot? Ehhhhh not so much — this is just some ineffable pining idiots fluff that grabbed me and demanded to be written. Will I write an actual fic with actual plot and shit later? We shall see...

Crowley hadn’t meant to fall, not really. He’d been discontent Up There, sure, and rather too inclined to ask questions, cause mischief, but when he’d sauntered after Lucifer he’d learned the hard way that hanging with the wrong crowd can get you into trouble. He could still feel an echo of the fire that had wracked his body when he slipped up and let himself remember. Then he’d do his damnedest to drown the memories in drink and if that failed, a really long nap. It didn’t really work. But it helped, a little, when Aziraphale joined him.

He hadn’t meant to fall for Aziraphale, either.

He’d been curious — and wasn’t that always his downfall? He’d slithered up to the angel as he stared into the distance, desperate to know what had brought that peculiar expression to his face as he watched the humans. A little hopeful, a little doubtful… a little something else. Was it love? Crowley supposed it must have been.

And then the angel had turned those sky-blue eyes on him and offered… what? Crowley still didn’t know. Sometimes he thought he saw that same expression in his angel’s eyes — and wasn’t he a fool for thinking it? Aziraphale wasn’t _his_ angel. He’d _never_ be his angel. But he couldn’t stop himself from thinking it, feeling his demonic heart squeeze a little with fondness only tinged with bitterness.

“Crowley, are you even listening to me?” Aziraphale asked, fork halted halfway to his mouth and expression one of fond annoyance. Around them, the faint strains of violins could be heard, amid the clink of glassware and the murmur of voices that made up the background noises of the Ritz.

He tipped his sunglasses down and peered at the angel in question. “Hmmm?”

“You _weren’t_.” Aziraphale huffed. “Well I’ll just have to tell you again.”

Crowley hid a smile behind his wineglass as his angel rambled — something about starfish, he thought, a tad fuzzily — and felt another pang from the region where his heart would be, were he human. Did demons have hearts? He hadn’t thought so, but when he was around his angel, his body seemed determined to prove him wrong.

Later, as they half-stumbled toward the Bentley, Aziraphale gripped his arm for balance and then just left it there, tucked snugly against his elbow. Crowley felt his fuzzy brain short-circuit a bit as he stared at their arms. Could he possibly mean… No. No, there was no way Crowley was going down that road tonight. It didn’t mean anything — they’d just saved the world* and scared the piss out of their respective head offices, and a little closeness was warranted after all that, right? Aziraphale was just being his usual exuberantly drunk self, wasn’t he? Crowley hesitantly reached over and patted his arm as they reached the Bentley, and he died just a little inside as Aziraphale pulled away. Right. Just being friendly, then.

*In a very small way. Really the world had pretty much saved itself and they’d bumbled along after it.

They were quiet on the drive back to Aziraphale’s bookshop. Crowley was wallowing in the sting of that rejection, and Aziraphale didn’t seem to have anything to say either. After what seemed an eternity watching the streets of London flash by around them** he pulled up in his customary parking space. He left the engine running and didn’t move to follow as he usually did when Aziraphale climbed out.

**But was really only a few minutes, as Crowley had pushed his car faster than he’d ever done before in order to get the awkwardness over with.

Aziraphale paused a few steps from the car and turned back, a tiny frown on his face. “Aren’t you coming in? I’ve a few bottles of—“

“Better not,” Crowley interrupted quickly, before Aziraphale could pull his usual puppy-dog eyes and get his way. “Things to do and all that.”

“Right,” Aziraphale said. He looked a bit deflated, standing there with his arm partially outstretched. “Er, I’ll see you—“

“I’ll see you when I see you, angel,” Crowley called back as he sped away. His bed was calling him and he wanted a _really_ long nap. A century or so sounded about right.

* * *

Crowley woke with a groan, dumped unceremoniously from a dream in which Aziraphale actually wanted him by an incessant pounding in his head. He put a hand to his forehead and grimaced as he drained the dregs of alcohol from his system. The pounding continued. _Not_ in his head, then.

With a weary sigh he pulled himself from his nest of blankets and stumbled to the door. He wrenched it open and blinked blearily at the too-bright figure in his doorway.

“Aziraphale?” he asked, frowning. “What are you doing here, angel?”

Aziraphale shouldered his way into Crowley’s flat, making a face when he noticed the wine bottles Crowley had neglected to vanish before falling into oblivion.

“Well, you shouldn’t have shown me where you lived if you didn’t intend for me to visit Crowley,” he said snippily. “You’ve been asleep for _ages_ and I needed to talk to you.”

Crowley looked at his watch and groaned, exasperated. “Aziraphale. It’s only been _two days_.”

“Yes,” Aziraphale said primly, “and that was two days too long.”

Crowley let that pass without comment, his eyes having fixed on the basket slung over Aziraphale’s arm.

“What’s that?” he asked, pointing to it.

“Hmmm? Oh. Well I — I brought lunch, you see. I thought we could have a bit of a … picnic?”

“A picnic.” Crowley tipped his sunglasses down and looked over them, amused.

“Yes,” Aziraphale said. “A picnic. By the ducks.”

“Angel—“ Crowley began, to say what he wasn’t sure. Something about sides and beauty rest and the fact that demons didn’t _do_ picnics and surely Aziraphale realized this, but Aziraphale interrupted him before he could say any of it.

“No, don’t you dare shut me out again. We’re on our own side, remember? I _need_ you Crowley. I don’t know anyone else. I was _lonely._ ”

“Oh, no,” Crowley said, putting up his hands as if to ward Aziraphale off. “Don’t pout at me like that.”

“But it always works,” Aziraphale beamed at him, and Crowley sighed.

“Balrghghg. Fine. Just— give me that.” He grabbed the basket from Aziraphale’s arm. “Lead the way, angel.”

* * *

After they’d eaten and spent a few minutes seated*** side by side, watching the ducks, Crowley turned to Aziraphale.

 _***_ Aziraphale sat. Crowley _lounged_ , as usual.

“What was it you needed to talk to me about so badly that you woke me up?”

“Oh. Well…”

“Yes?”

“That is. Oh, you’re making this difficult on purpose!” Aziraphale exclaimed, looking distressed.

Crowly sighed. “Perhaps if I knew what _this_ was?”

“You know I don’t have anyone else I can talk to about — about _things_. They don’t understand Up There, what it’s like, living among humans, and—“

Crowley interrupted. “Oh, no,” he said, thinking about Gabriel saying ‘shut your stupid mouth and die already,’ “you’re never going Up There again angel.”

“Oh, Well. Then I suppose you’ll just have to spend more time with me,” Aziraphale said, brightening.

Crowley sighed. “Fell into that one, rather, didn’t I?”

“A bit.” Aziraphale grinned cheekily at him. Then he sobered. “But I don’t want you going Down There either. It was _awful_ Crowley! Well, I suppose you know that, but—“

“I don’t want to go Down There either angel, don’t worry. Hopefully we’ve bought ourselves some time.”

They sat silently for a moment, watching the ducks swimming in the pond and the children running across the grass.

“Crowley?”

“Hmmm?”

“It’s awfully, well, _lonely_ at the bookshop these days.”

“Well, you could try actually letting customers in.”

Aziraphale swatted at his shoulder. “You know what I mean.”

“Suppose I do, angel. What do you want me to do about it, hmmm?”

“Well. You see, I was wondering.” Aziraphale bit his lip and his cheeks turned adorably pink. Crowley kicked himself for thinking he was adorable.

“What if you were to, I don’t know, stay over sometime. Or all the time. If you’d like, that is. It would be nice knowing what you were up to. Now that we don’t have to check in with our head offices and file paperwork and—“

“All right, angel, don’t get so worked up.”

Aziraphale’s voice trembled slightly. “I _missed_ you Crowley. I always thought I liked being alone with my books but I just. I hate it when you’re gone!”

Crowley sighed. “Yeah, me too angel.” He slowly reached out and laid his fingers over Aziraphales outstretched hand where it lay on the blanket between them.

Aziraphale intertwined their fingers and squeezed. Crowley though his far-too-human heart might melt and ooze out of his chest at the contact.

“Well, Good then. I’ll just enlarge the flat a bit so there’s room for your plants,” Aziraphale said firmly.

“What about my statues?” Crowley asked, leering at him out of long habit.

Aziraphale’s cheeks grew pinker. “That too,” he said. “We’ll put them in the front of the shop. Perhaps that will discourage customers.” He gazed up at Crowley from under his lashes and Crowley felt himself falling a little farther.

With a tiny resigned shrug he slung an arm over his angel’s shoulder. When Aziraphale melted against his side with a happy sigh, he thought maybe there was something to that ineffable plan after all.

 


End file.
